Tag Archives: canadian bank bailouts

Bank of Canada slips into its new niche.

So here we go again, not that it has really stopped since 2006, but since 2011 the Canadian administration BS and bafflegab has gone hip high to an elephant.

 

On Wednesday 21st January 2015 the Bank of Canada confirmed again that it is now nothing more than an inflation watchdog. The Governor of the Bank of Canada has even proudly claimed that that is the Bank’s #1 priority  when he said on November 4th 2014, Standing Committee on Finance in response to a long garbled question by James Rajotte, and I quote from Hansard

 

“Tying that to the second half of your question is very important. The Bank of Canada has only one goal, and that’s to keep inflation on its target within a timeframe of around six to eight quarters. That’s our horizon of flexibility.”…..Hansard with my highlights.

 

 

Any economist, or for that matter teenager, knows that if you reduce your income and increase your expenditures you are heading for financial disaster. Regretfully there does not appear to be an economist (or anyone even with the acumen of a teenager) in the ranks of the present administration as they have from day one reduced Canada’s income by drastically cutting corporate tax rates, minutely cutting personal tax rates, reducing GST absolutely unnecessarily, increasing personal taxes by a thousand mini cuts such as  tariff increases etc., and their lavish expenses have skyrocketed. We need 30 more very expensive MPs , $16 dollar glasses of orange juice or million dollar ferrying of a security limo for presidential PM use in India to give just a few examples, in the same way we need holes in our heads. 

Well hold on Arney there was a melt down in 2008 wasn’t there?

 

Yes there was and it was categorically denied by the Harper government. During the 2008 election $75 billion was donated to our Canadian banks through the CMHA even while Harper and Flaherty were trying to say we were immune from the problems coming fast and hard at the rest of the world and claiming that our banks were rock solid!  This eventually topped out at a whopping $114 billion in 2009.

 

Two months later whilst still saying there wasn’t a problem Harper had to prorogue to avoid being defeated in the House and removed from power. He still could not see a problem!

 

So yesterday there he was answering questions about the economy and admitting that the price of oil was in fact costly to the Canadian bank account (Which bank are they using for their accounts by the way or are they all getting a piece of the pie)

 

So the price of oil has gone down substantially. Why? Not because it is now cheaper to extract it from the ground, transport the oil to refineries and turn it into a burnable fuel. No it’s because there is more oil available then there is a need for. A glut. Wonderful.

 

So will the price come up again? Most likely because the oil companies are too big to fail, and too blind to see the writing on the wall, and administrations such as that in Canada today will probably throw money at them that should be going to vets, seniors, the homeless, to help charities not cripple them, the infrastructure and the provinces.   Very likely that this is what will happen with Harper’s government because they are not interested in the health, fortune, wellbeing or standard of living of any Canadian who is not a card carrying CPC member and even they are often lumped in with the rest of us and told to fend for themselves.

 

Our manufacturing output is down because corporations like, CAT, Navistar (transport truck manufacturer), Kellogg’s, PACCAR( Kenworth and Peterbilt makers), Steelco, Alcoa, etc., have left the Canadian scene along with their lost jobs, union pensions and taxes.   I also understand that Bombardier are seriously contemplating moving lock stock and barrel to Mexico soon.   Now that one will really hurt.

 

So, is all lost?   Depends on how well the new ”UN”fair elections act works for the administratio with the extra tools they have given themselves to steal their 4th election in a row later this year.

 

If everyone in the country becomes registered to vote and obtains the necessary ID, then acts upon that right to vote no matter how much there is disruption at the voting places caused by the CPC scrutinizers who will try and create massive lineups and delays and make non CPC voters give up in disgust, we can get a real peoples’ government back. This distruption will be done with the aid of something called bingo cards which will tell them when their own supporters have voted and allow them to start causing a ruckus to prevent anyone else from voting.

 

If we believe that we all have the right to vote in spite of Harper’s government efforts to take that away from us, and exercise that right we can and will get rid of the worst Prime Minister, and his government, that Canada has ever had, and start the job of rebuilding what was once a nation to be believed in.

 

Of course I would want everyone to vote for the Canadian Action Party where we have Candidates as we are probably the only party which specifically wants to represent our constituents to the HOC not the HOC to our constituents. Where our MP votes will be free and caucus meetings an exchange of ideas not relaying dictums from above. Where the Bank of Canada will again be used to finance Canada’s needs at little or no cost and manufacturing jobs will return home instead of leaving for Mexico or somewhere else where labour is cheap and the products reflect that.

 

A country where once again Canadians can be proud to be part of it, and proud to help rebuild a country to help the world not cause wars, civilian deaths and destruction as in the case of Libya for instance. A nation whose standard of living was so far ahead of ours under Ghadafi until we destroyed everything he had built for his people from the safety of the air in the name of maintaining a no fly zone, turning them back into the stone age; where no government now exists and contestantly mercenary bands are fighting for control; where raping and civilian killings continue at pace, and their state owned bank has been replaced by  central bank sponsored by the IMF.

Some democracy we created there!

 So welcome Bank of Canada to your new role as inflation watchdog. Rest well for when we call on you to return to and fulfill your real role in Canada.

Join the movement to recover Canada in 2015.

Vote for CAP or anyone who will represent you to Ottawa, not Ottawa to you.

 

Jeremy Arney

Whats up Stephen? I tried to warn you.

In the year 2008, at a town Hall meeting on Salt Spring Island during the federal election, I accused both the Conservatives and Liberals of being short sighted concerning the economic health of North America and posed the question to everyone there

What is your back up plan for when the economic crunch hits?

I was naturally laughed at, specially by Gary Lunn of the Reform/Alliance coalition, yet just a few months later after a huge panic , proroguing of parliament to maintain the government of apparently paralized non believers (or outright liars) , and a large budget that just could not have been produced in the time it took from denial to presentation in parliament, this government produced a direction with which I have never agreed.
They had an opportunity to change the face of Canada and reestablish Canada as a productive nation.
Since FTA and NAFTA we have been bleeding manufacturing companies, plants and jobs to Mexico, USA and of course Asia.
So here was a chance to spend money with two purposes instead of just one.
What we got was a huge spending spree largely in Conservative ridings or ridings they wanted to win, to fix up bridges, roads, arenas etc., none of which created long term full time jobs with benefits; in fact I would argue that very few new jobs were created through this program anyway. What we have had is an increase of part time, non-benefit jobs which are neither sustaining nor productive.
What we could have had as I even proposed during that election campaign of 2008, was to start production of such things as solar panels made in recently closed saw mills or pulp mills, or manufacturing pre cut log homes to export all over the world, instead of just exporting raw logs. Production of recycled wood, or even using pine beetle killed lumber to produce presto logs for burning in fire places – in fact now we in BC import presto logs from Washington State.

To give an example if I may, we have almost finished a $24 million overpass on the #17 highway here on Vancouver Island at the Victoria Airport exit. Apparently the business plan says it will pay $144 million over 20 years so it is a good business plan. My question was who will be making that $144 million, and it turns out that it is ICBC (Insurance Corporation of BC) who will benefit from the apparent lack of accidents cost. Well dear lord this was one of the safest intersections on the highway so surely a better business plan would have encouraged any of the other intersections to be replaced. I was unable to get from the Minister of Transport how many, if any, new jobs were created by this $24 million, bearing in mind that job creation was supposed to be the main reason for the spending of this stimulus money. I also got no answer about how many full time jobs would result after the completion of this job, so obviously it was an excuse to spend money in a weak riding of a junior minister of state

What has happened is that the government has turned its back on real production here in Canada; innovation and foresight are gone, to be replaced with the destruction of our ecology for the sake of oil, gas, gold and coal mines etc., The fracking process to extract gas is now established in the north east of BC with no regard for what it is doing to either the rivers lakes or streams or worse yet the aquifers which are all being contaminated by toxic waste water forced into the earth under extreme pressure. Nothing else matters but the ravaging of our country for the sake of exports of natural resources to both the USA and China. Unfortunately none of the companies involved in this exporting business are Canadian owned so we are actually not getting any real benefit from this raping of our earth, the destruction of aboriginal ways of life and the giving away of our commons.

I do believe that as long as we avoid the concept of producing real things here in Canada for consumption here and abroad, we will be a small bit player eating on the crumbs thrown our way by the real economies around the world.

I hear again and again from this government that we are through the recession which was not of our making, and that we didn’t bail out our banks – what? I make it a $75 billion bailout.

“The Honourable Jim Flaherty, Minister of Finance, today announced the Government will purchase up to an additional $50 billion of insured mortgage pools by the end of the fiscal year as part of its ongoing efforts to maintain the availability of longer-term credit in Canada.

This action will increase to $75 billion the maximum value of securities purchased through Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) under this program. The Main Wire, November 12, 2008

and they were still trying at that time to say that there wasn’t a problem !

On top of that we were told by Harper:

At the height of the election campaign, Prime Minister Harper stated emphatically that: “this is not a bailout… it will cost the government nothing.” (CBC News, October 10, 2008).

So who paid for it Harper? Your fairy godmother?

Another lie is that we are the best in the G20 – oh come on get real here, how can we be the best if we don’t make anything, if we have a huge and growing unemployment problem, homeless everywhere, sick and mentally ill not getting any attention, and an alienation of our aboriginal peoples, a growing debt problem and reduced income levels due to huge tax cuts to high profit corporations?

This is the best in the G20? Who is kidding who here?

We are rapidly sinking into a “have not” country so that it will be easier for USA to swallow us up, just as Harper has wanted ever since he became prime minister.

At the same time as this money was being spent on ‘infrastructure’, we purchased:
Army trucks and rescue planes:
Our government is going to spend 274 million dollars buying 1,300 “heavily armoured” trucks (that’s $210,769 each – presumably US $ at that) for “domestic” use by the Canadian army from the USA, and then another 3 billion buying Italian planes, also to be made in the USA, to replace the aging fleet of Buffalo rescue planes on the west coast.   from my letter to the local paper editor.

As a result of that army trucks purchase from the USA, the International Harvester plant in Chatham laid off many workers which was of course a loss of jobs and tax revenue to both levels of government…Good job MacKay, trustworthy as ever I see, and how you could not see that coming is beyond me.

Navistar sent out 500 layoff notices to its Chatham workforce last week, with another 200 expected in the spring. thestar,com Wednesday Jan 14th 2009

For Air Sea Rescue planes, Viking Air of Calgary, Aberta and Sidney, BC, both in Conservative ridings. lost out to the US made Italian design even though they told MacKay they could do a better job ….didn’t cut any ice with him of course, and Canadian jobs were not a priority….!

We won’t even get into the costly new one engine stealth fighter from the US when the Russians have one every bit as good, ready now at less money one would have thought. Any way what are we doing putting our flyers at risk in the north with only one engine?

There is a sickness about this particular government that I find very hard to understand. The verbal stuff we hear from it is pro Canadian, and yet the practice is totally the opposite. Such is the control by the prime minister he might as well be the dictator he imagines himself to be. “I make the rules” does not fit with a democratic form of government and it bothers me that there are still some people in this country who cannot see what he us up to and actually support his desire to destroy Canada as we have known it.

It is obvious to me that as long as we reduce our income, and waste a fortune of public money on partisan advertising, very bad purchasing of material stuff, gross mismanagement of major portfolios, a dysfunctional government which has been challenged on parliamentary contempt more than any government on our history we will not be able to stand on our own feet much longer.

What have you done Stephen and is your mother proud of you?

Jeremy Arney